1. Field of The Invention
The invention relates to an auxiliary device for easy assembling the computer, especially to holding means for temporarily joining a pair of screws with a slide latch as one unit for easy fastening to a connector mounted to the backpanel of the computer.
2. The Prior Art
It is seen that many I/O ports are positioned on the backpanel or backplane of the computer to communicate with external peripherals through the connectors mounted on such backpanel. In the traditional connection, clips are used in such I/O connectors to secure other complementary connectors thereto which are connected to the corresponding peripherals, respectively. Clip structure used with the I/O connector can be found in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,671,594, 4,721,473, 4,874,336, 4,904,202 and 5,004,430. In the recent years, Local Area Network (LAN) became more popular wherein the slide latch, which functions somewhat as the clip, is presented to latchably attach a peripheral connector to the corresponding I/O connector mounted on the backpanel, and has become standardized as shown in pages 3893 through 3896 of International standard ISO 8802-3 ANSI/IEEE Std 802.3 published on Feb. 24, 1989.
Unlike the clips which are manufactured associated with the I/O port connector and have already been unitary portions of the connector, the slide latch is a separate component with regard to the I/O connector before both such I/O connector and slide latch are fastened to the backpanel of the computer case. It is understood that in the aforementioned situation, such I/O connector is only fastened on add-on card, which is positioned inside the backpanel, but has not been secured to the backpanel. It has been experienced by the operator of the computer manufacturer who assembles the whole computer including these two components, i.e., the slide latch and the connector, that it is a little difficult to quickly or easily implement this job. It is because the operator needs to use the left hand to simultaneously hold the slide latch in position with regard to the I/O connector and hold the screw in alignment with the corresponding screw hole of the I/O connector, and then use the right hand to insert such screw into the screw hole by means of a screw manual/electrical driver. Because the screw used in the computer is too small to hold, sometimes, using the fingers of a single (left) hand can not efficiently and simultaneously have both the separate slide latch and screw(s) placed in position without struggling.
Therefore, an object of the present invention is to provide means which can temporarily hold or combine the slide latch and screws together to form one unit wherein the screws are in position ready to enter and to be in alignment with the screw holes in the I/O connector so that the operator can easily hold such pre-assembled unit by one hand, and use another hand to operate the screw driver to insert the screws of such unit into the screw holes of the I/O connector for fastening the slide latch and the connector to the backpanel of the computer case.
Another object of the present invention is to provide the aforementioned holding means wherein such holding means can be function as a dust-cover to protect the inner I/O connector when no peripheral connector is connected thereto.